A San Antonio jury ordered Peripheral Vascular Associates to pay $8.1 million in damages for fraudulent Medicare claims after several whistleblowers brought evidence to court.
The jury ordered Peripheral VA to pay exactly $2.7 million in damages on February 15 back to the federal government, but that total has tripled to $8.1 million under the False Claims Act, according to a news release and court documents. Justin Berger, attorney for the whistleblowers, says the False Claims Act allows these former Peripheral VA employees to bring fraudulent acts to court.
Peripheral made over 7,000 fraudulent Medicare claims, according to court documents, of which the company could pay up to $11,000 in penalty fees per claim. Berger says the judge still has to assess these fees.
"We were extremely fortunate to have three clients who were willing to put their names and reputations on the line to help recover money for the Medicare program." Berger says in the news release, "Trials in False Claims Act cases are extremely rare because the stakes are so high for both sides."
Court documents don't specifically list any individuals from the company but Peripheral VA's was founded by Dr. David Mozersky in 1975 and its current CEO is John Gilpin.
Peripheral VA fraudulently billed Medicare and overcharged taxpayers for sonography services that did not happen, according to court documents. One of the whistleblowers noticed ultrasound orders that were purportedly filed on their system by her on...
Pakistani actress and model Ayesha Omar has strongly denied a controversial statement falsely attributed to her on social media. In recent days, a statement circulated online claiming that the act...